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MoMa Modern Playhouse

The best toys are those that offer your child an open experience, a semi-blank slate providing them with the opportunity to begin building and shaping their own ideas within a common structure and sense of function. This very simple set of cardboard pieces from MoMA provide all of this and may just be the building blocks for a career in design!

The modular shapes and designs can be fit together in a variety of combinations to form a modern, yet retro playhouse, complete with a faux-fireplace. In all honesty, this place kind of looks like a toned down bachelor pad, ala Ewan MacGregor’s place in Down with Love. Who knows what kinds of scenes will take place in this den of iniquity if your child gets ahold of the accompanying paper dolls?

All kidding aside, this toy is more than just a toy. Instead, it’s a chance to explore variations on a theme, as well as the idea of combining, revising, and re-combining. In essence, the “play” involved is the act of designing, understanding aesthetic appeal, and understanding how spaces work. This is the stuff that future Cooper Union-ites are made of. And thus, you’ve tricked your kid into learning about really abstract ideas- all through play. Mission accomplished!